New Star Citizen Video Shows Impressive Tech, Single Player Tease, as Alpha 3.0 Gets Small Delay

New Star Citizen Video Shows Impressive Tech, Single Player Tease, as Alpha 3.0 Gets Small Delay

Star Citizen shows its new holographic tech, on top of the first appearance of Ben Mendelsohn as Julian Wexler in Squadron 42.

Chris Roberts’ Cloud Imperium games released a new video of its upcoming game Star Citizen.

The video starts with the (relatively) bad news, as alpha 3.0 has been slightly delayed. It was supposed to release around Gamescom time at the end of August, but due to the team needing a few more days to polish and optimize the version that will be provided backers, it will now be released between September 4th, and September 8th.

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The great news for those like me that don’t have enormous bandwidth, is that the team is also working on a new patcher that will download only updated files, finally removing those nasty 30 gigabytes downloads from the picture.

The video then moves on the impressive stuff, showing a new tech called “Secondary Viewports” that allows the game to render a scene on a texture or on an holographic display, creating some really interesting communication and possibilities, even more so for the narrative of the single player version of the game named “Squadron 42.”

We also get a nice tease in the form of the very first appearance in work-in-progress Squadron 42 footage of Ready Player One villain Ben Mendelsohn, and the reveal of his character, Archon Facilities Director Julian Wexler. The character appeared in Star Citizen fiction before, and we actually have a bio.

“Julian Wexler started his career under the tutelage of Bill Erickson at the Stanton Office. After Erickson’s resignation 3 years ago, Julian was transferred to the Archon Base where he has been using his unique managerial skills to help revitalize the station.”

Alongside Mendelsohn, we also see Game of Thrones star Liam Cunningham in action as Captain Noah White, and Kick-Ass‘ Sophie Wu as Lieutenant Cara Webster.

This is certainly interesting, considering that Squadron 42 is – like the old and glorious Wing Commander series – mostly a military drama, but apparently Mendelsohn’s character is a civilian businessman. Why is he talking to the captain of a UEE capital ship remains a mystery.